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Daily industrial news and top headlines for plant and maintenance managers

The E-Fuel MicroFueler consists of a simple idea: bring ethanol production to the residential level. The MicroFueler is a 250-gallon tank, with an attached fuel pump just like the ones you would find at the local Shell station, which converts organic feedstock into pure ethanol.
Chances are you have some old, skunky beer or a bottle of red wine that’s aged a little past its prime.

Schott built its pharmaceutical packaging facility with twice the footprint necessary for existing operations. When advances in biotechnology created a demand for syringes, the company had room to install a state-of-the-art production line.
Extra space is a luxury not afforded by most plants.

With the economy still weak and competitive pressures continuing to rise, reducing expenses is imperative for industrial businesses. Yet many underestimate or neglect a key source of savings: the electricity bill. That’s because we have a tendency to see energy as a largely uncontrollable cost—we need the energy we need when we need it, and often are dealing with a monopoly provider.

ORRVILLE, Ohio (AP) — The J.M. Smucker Co. is closing four plants and cutting 700 jobs, about 15 percent of its workforce, the food maker said Wednesday.
The company, which makes Folgers Coffee, Smucker's jams and other products, said it is closing its fruit-spread plants in Memphis, Tenn.

If you took a stroll through the aisles of Columbia Tech, the turnkey contract manufacturing division of Coghlin Companies, Inc. in Worcester, MA, you’d stumble across a bevy of items in various stages of production: one might be a subsystem for an Ion implanter, another a cellulite reduction tool, and steps away, an explosion sniffing device used for security and detection.

A more hopeful scenario comes courtesy of SRC Holdings in Springfield, MO. When the company first started (following the recession of 1983), it was doing engine remanufacturing and had taken on $8.9 million of debt.
“When we were starting out in the 1980s, more than 75 percent of our labor hours were in the truck market,” says CEO Jack Slack.

A recent Google search revealed 290 million hits on “economy,” compared to 405 million on “environment.” Even a cursory review of the annual reports of publicly traded companies reveals goal after goal related to the environment. Why? Not only do both federal and state legislation incentivize these efforts, but also regulatory statements mandate compliance.

RathGibson is a leading provider of precision engineered stainless steel, nickel, and titanium welded, welded and drawn, and seamless straight lengths, coil, and U-bend tubing to a wide variety of markets such as chemical, petrochemical, power generation, oil and gas, food and beverage, pharmaceutical, biopharmaceutical, medical, biotechnology, and general commercial.

SHANGHAI (AP) — Australia and China signed a multibillion dollar energy deal Wednesday, pushing ahead with business as the trial of four employees of mining giant Rio Tinto ended in Shanghai with a verdict still to be announced.
The latest deal suggests that Australia and China's commercial ties have been largely unaffected by tensions over the detention and trial of Australian citizen Stern Hu — who was head of Rio Tinto's iron ore business in China — and three Chinese co-workers on charges of taking bribes and stealing business secrets.

At first glance, today’s retailers and food and beverage (F&B) manufacturers appear to be in a fierce battle of the brands. Retailers facing mounting pressures to differentiate continue to successfully expand and launch private brands in the marketplace. Meanwhile, F&B manufacturers are trying to protect their brand value and win back market share.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Car manufacturer Daimler AG will pay $185 million to settle criminal and civil investigations in which the company is accused of paying tens of millions of dollars in bribes to officials of at least 22 foreign governments over the course of a decade, two people familiar with the deal said Tuesday.

NEW YORK (AP) — The city's former chief crane inspector admitted taking more than $10,000 in payoffs to fake inspection and crane operator licensing exam results, selling out a 26-year career bit by bit over nearly a decade.
James Delayo showed no emotion Tuesday as he pleaded guilty to receiving bribes and read a short statement in court acknowledging his crimes in a case that helped raise questions about the city's oversight of construction and spurred changes designed to keep a tighter rein on cranes.

ROME (AP) — Fiat will cut 5,000 jobs in Italy, slash the number of car models and increase production as part of its new strategic plan, a newspaper reported Wednesday.
La Repubblica said the cuts would affect about 15 percent of the 30,000 assembly line workers at Fiat. They would include between 2,000 and 2,500 workers at the historic Mirafiori plant in Turin and some 1,500 employee at the Termini Imerese plant in Sicily, which will stop auto production next year.

JEFFERSON CITY, Tenn. (AP) — Body armor manufacturer BAE Systems is laying off about 200 employees at its East Tennessee plant because of a sluggish economy and the failure to win an anticipated contract.
WBIR reported that the layoffs will leave about 120 employees on the job. The company cut 74 jobs at theplant in February.

SHANGHAI (AP) — It's not quite as foldable as the space vehicle that cartoon figure George Jetson pops into his briefcase as he bops into the office.
But the EN-V concept car, GM's "automobile solution" for the future, just might fit into an apartment foyer.
General Motors and its Chinese partner SAIC will showcase the "Electric Networked-Vehicle" launched Wednesday in their joint pavilion at the Shanghai Expo, which opens May 1 and runs for six months.

Keytroller’s (Tampa, FL) Weightroller 100 and 100+ are hydraulic scales accurate to within 2 percent of the lifting capacity of the machine. They now provide a forklift operator with a visual (flash) and audible (beep) at the approach of unsafe overload conditions.

The SMARTON from Konecranes (Springfield, OH) is an overhead crane designed to minimize total lifecycle costs and maximize productivity, along with being rugged and flexible in challenging industrial environments. The SMARTON can lift loads ranging from 30 tons to more than 500 tons.

Absolute E-Z UP (Charleston, SC) offers the ISP-11 inventory management solution, with an innovative driving system that maintains a 57” outside turning radius and allows the platform to rotate a complete turn on its axis. The ISP-11 can be operated in locations with high-density shelving systems and congested aisle-ways, and features a platform capacity of 187 pounds and the ability to drive over a 35 percent grade.